Remembering Sir Thomas Beecham

This week Meet the Artist will feature a pair of interviews with musicians who are paying tribute to the great Sir Thomas Beecham in a special concert of music by the composer he revered above all others – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The concert also marks the launch of a new orchestra.

The interviews are with composer, conductor and musicologist Alan Tongue (who successfully transcribed and edited Vaughan William’s A Cambridge Mass which he randomly found in Cambridge’s University Library); and Richard Friedman, first violin (co-leader) of the Birmingham Royal Ballet.

Richard’s father Leonard Friedman, a famous violinist himself and founder of the Scottish Baroque Ensemble, became the leader of a number of symphony orchestras in London and elsewhere, including an astonishing period as the co-leader of the Royal Philharmonic under Sir Thomas Beecham. Richard Friedman remembers meeting Beecham as a child – the great conductor told his father “your son has a very good ear“.

Alan Tongue and Richard Friedman have teamed up to found the Beecham Orchestra (of which Richard is also leader). The orchestra is launched at a debut concert at Cadogan Hall on 4th April 2017. Full details here